


The Ballad of Iwaizumi Hajime

by TentacleBubbles



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: AU, Alternate Universe - Dark, Gen, Iwaizumi did something idk what, Oikawa killed a man oh yeah, Prison AU I think?, They're in prison
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-25
Updated: 2015-12-25
Packaged: 2018-05-09 06:28:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,963
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5529437
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TentacleBubbles/pseuds/TentacleBubbles
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alternate title: The Ballad of an Angel's Fall</p>
<p>A sort of crossover between Haikyuu and Oscar Wilde's poem The Ballad of Reading Gaol.</p>
<p>Iwaizumi Hajime thinks, sometimes, that life's ripple effect is too absurd. How did saying he saw something lead to him seeing an angel fall?</p>
<p>Heavy metaphors, tons of implying and avoiding saying the actual thing. Also, the ship is vague and only hinted at.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Ballad of Iwaizumi Hajime

**Author's Note:**

> I was reading Oscar Wilde's The Ballad of Reading Gaol and immediately Oikawa in grey prison clothes being walked by some guards, among a sea of other prisoners came to my mind. It was an aesthetically pleasing picture, so yeah.

For strange it was to see him pass

With a step so light and gay,

And strange it was to see him look

So wistfully at the day,

And strange it was to think that he

Had such a debt to pay.

  * ‘The Ballad of Reading Gaol’ by Oscar Wilde



 

Iwaizumi Hajime was an honest man. He was an honest man, and yet his honesty was what landed him in prison. Iwaizumi Hajime never liked it, but he acknowledged life’s irony.

The prison was grey, and gloomy, and even though he knew he was only to stay there for five months, Iwaizumi couldn’t help feeling that there was no escape from the bars and the walls and the guards, and the despair would be forever.

Iwaizumi Hajime had never seen such a large collection of horribly miserable men, never thought he’d be living with them. It was not that he feared for his life, but that he knew everyone around him had already lost theirs. To land in such a prison as Gaol was akin to landing in your own personal Hell. Again, Iwaizumi’s reminded that he shouldn’t have been so honest, not to such a character that did not hesitate to put him in such a horrible place, even for a short time, even for such a small crime.

Three months he endured silently, holding on to the one hope that each day brought him closer to the gates, closer to leaving the grey, soul sucking place. Each plate of grey food, each cup of greyish water, each day out in the grey yard and each night inside a greying cell, staring through the bars out at the silver moon, sometimes even without that. Each of those he endured silently, for there was no speaking, no looking, no way of communicating the nothingness each person in the prison felt.

Iwaizumi Hajime had never seen such a bright person. Or perhaps he did, in his past life, his life before the prison. But never did he see that brightness in such a gloomy, dark hole as Gaol. It was annoyingly bright, Iwaizumi notes, but he found he didn’t mind the annoying brightness. He suspected he might have craved it.

_“That fellow’s got to swing.”_

Iwaizumi cannot remember who said it, only that he heard it from behind him, from the others who had gathered to gaze at the newcomer. It baffled him, intrigued him, nauseated him, until all around him all were just blurs of grey he couldn’t discern. But he didn’t fall, he stood still, amidst the sea of stone grey, watching with stone cold eyes.

Who could walk so lightly, with such an easy smile, with his head high, knowing that he were to be hanged? Who could have such an angelic face, a wistful, pleasant expression, when buried in the deep recesses of greyish hell? Apparently he could, this mysterious man, this somewhat less quiet man.

Iwaizumi chose the phrase ‘less quiet’ not because he spoke. The man did not speak, for speaking was a freedom, and there was no freedom to be had in Gaol. No, he was as voiceless as the rest of them, but he _expressed_. He frowned, recoiled, _pouted_ when he first ate his grey meal, first drank his greyish water. Sometime in the night, very late in the night, at least in the first night, Iwaizumi heard a voice, so soft and melodious he nearly believed it really was an angel. But it was simply the man in the cell next to his, the mysterious man. He was humming, and though the guard quickly put a stop to it the hum was already stuck in Iwaizumi’s mind. He could not understand how such a man, with such a light step, could stare so wistfully, so continuously, up at the blue sky, as if he just wanted to fly away to freedom.

Perhaps the whole prison felt what Iwaizumi felt, whatever it was. He knew the once bowed heads, the shaved, heavy heads that were always facing the grey ground, rarely bowed when the mysterious man came. All gazes were always trained on him, in his light steps, on his wistful face, on all the expressions he never hesitated to make. He knew that all felt _something_ in their hearts that had long turned grey and cold, and it was something of the mysterious man.

Iwaizumi wished he could tell someone, anyone that the man had spoken once. He had, because Iwaizumi had also spoken. He didn’t know how, but he knew that night that nobody in the halls would be listening, no demon guarded against what little freedoms could sneak in to comfort them. He wasn’t sure why, but he knew the man was still awake. And he remembered the mysterious man’s face, his hair, rich and brown and not at all shaven like the rest of them. (Not that Iwaizumi was any balder. His stay was not, as much as he struggled to remember, not permanent, and his freedom to let his spiky black hair grow back was a sign of it).

“They didn’t cut your hair.”

Iwaizumi had perhaps forgotten how normal conversations started. But it got the man’s attention, and Iwaizumi could almost imagine it directed at him, that wistful smile.

“No, they didn’t. I am to die, anyway.”

He supposed that made sense, and Iwaizumi felt he needed to keep the conversation going. But what did he have to say? What did they have at all, in that empty grey world? What did they have left?

“My name’s Iwaizumi. Iwaizumi Hajime.”

At this the man made a startled sound. Was it so strange to give his name? Perhaps, Iwaizumi thought, perhaps giving his name meant he was parting from the grey sea that flooded the prison. He was no longer just another grey face, he was an individual. He had a name.

“Iwa-chan.”

The man said with a laugh, and it irked Iwaizumi, not the laugh but the nickname. Except the laugh was something amazing, something he didn’t think he’d hear anymore.

“Iwa-chan, did you know, I’m going to die because I killed someone.”

“Well that was obvious.”

Iwaizumi Hajime had also perhaps forgotten that he was not very good with words. But before he could try to remedy it he could hear the laughter again.

“Yes, it was.”

(Somehow it made him want to cry)

There was silence, and Iwaizumi wanted to chase it away, but he didn’t know of any way how. He tried, very hard, to look for what he could say. He wanted to say anything, everything, so long as he still had the freedom.

“I’m an honest man.”

It didn’t sound like a plea. To Iwaizumi it sounded very much like an accusation, and to him that was exactly what it was. So he continued to say it.

“I’m an honest man, and I told them what I saw, which is why I ended up here. If I had lied and said I saw nothing, perhaps I’d still be out there, working for them. What a joke.”

“Yeah, what a joke they are.”

Iwaizumi was surprised by this answer, and he didn’t know why he was surprised. He knew, at least, that that was not what he expected. He didn’t know what he expected either.

“Hey, Iwa-chan, listen to my story, okay? I want to say it.”

Confused, yet somehow understanding, Iwaizumi felt he _needed_ to hear the story. The story of this wistful man who wanted to fly but killed someone instead. He didn’t need to answer, however, for the man was intent on telling his story either way.

“I had this apprentice, who was almost as great as I was. Can I tell you his name? His name’s Kageyama Tobio. I sort of want to see him again, he always gets so adorably angry when I point out his mistakes. He’s really good, though, almost as gifted as I am, and I liked teasing him because it made me feel better. But one day he got into a fight- he’s always scowling and it always made him so easy to punch.”

The man laughed again, at the memory no doubt, and Iwaizumi found himself wishing he could share it. Not just the memory but the laughter. He so wanted to laugh again, even when he wasn’t a person who liked to laugh often.

“He got into a fight with one of my regulars, who happened to be a very important man. But he was bullying Tobio-chan, and only I could do that. When I saw him hit my apprentice, who didn’t even do anything to defend himself, I guess I lost it. Only I could bully Tobio-chan, and only I could say who touched my stuff. You could say I killed ‘cause I wanted to protect Tobio-chan, but really I was being selfish. Don’t you think so, Iwa-chan?”

Iwaizumi didn’t know what to say. Did he think so? He didn’t think so, no. He thought, that maybe the man was- he thought that-

“I think you’re an idiot.”

Saying it out loud was like pushing a button to open something, and Iwaizumi Hajime laughed, for the first time in three months (nearly four months now). He laughed a short, barking laughter that ended too quickly, but it felt so good, and he couldn’t wait for it to happen again.

“That’s so mean, Iwa-chan!!”

Iwaizumi could imagine the man pouting, his whine completely childish, and he was glad they weren’t in the same room. He couldn’t stop the smile that crept to his face. He was sure it was important that nobody saw him smile. He thought perhaps it didn’t matter too much why he was smiling.

The hanging was inevitable, but since that night Iwaizumi began to pray. He had never been a religious man, and in that grey world it felt like there was no religion at all. But for the first time since he could remember, Iwaizumi Hajime really wanted to pray, really had something he felt justified enough to pray for. He also knew he wasn’t the only one. Whatever their reason may be, their reason that was so obviously that man, many of the grey faces from the sea flooding the prison bowed their heads, knelt on the stone cold floor, and prayed.

Iwaizumi Hajime never thought angels could look so ugly. Perhaps, he thought, perhaps that was how Lucifer looked when he was cast down from heaven and straight to the pits of hell. Perhaps his bright skin was also drained of life, his eyes glassy and white, his face contorted in pain and agony and regret. Perhaps those who witnessed it, whether they were angels or humans, also felt their stomachs drop, their eyes threaten with tears, some might have gone bleach white or an even darker grey.

Iwaizumi Hajime wanted to visit his grave. He knew, he was certain, it was just a hole somewhere near the prison, nameless, blank, the man buried without ceremony like the remains of an animal. But he wanted to go to it, to see it, to shout to the heavens that it was not a nameless animal, not just a sack of bones and dead flesh. He wanted to tell someone, anyone that that night, when they had spoken, the man had given him the one thing he had left. The mysterious, wistful man had given Iwaizumi Hajime his name.

_“Iwa-chan, call me a nickname too, okay? My name’s Oikawa Tooru.”_

_Iwaizumi paused, considered his words carefully._

_“Alright, what about Asskawa? Trashkawa?”_

_“Iwa-chan, you’re so mean!!”_

_Again there was the whine, and the pout. And again there was the laugh, and this time Iwaizumi Hajime and Oikawa Tooru were laughing together._

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic in Haikyuu!! and my first fic posted in ao3 so a review would be appreciated :D Thank you!


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